


Match Point

by dbskyler



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-01
Updated: 2018-09-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 11:15:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15862509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dbskyler/pseuds/dbskyler
Summary: It's the game they play.  She doesn't mean it.  Neither does he.  Until he does.





	Match Point

**Author's Note:**

> Some of the dialogue is from (in order): "Invasion of the Dinosaurs" by Malcolm Hulke, "Terror of the Zygons" by Robert Banks Stewart, "The Android Invasion" by Terry Nation, and "The Hand of Fear" by Bob Baker and Dave Martin.

It starts at the beginning. They leave the Middle Ages and when they've landed she teases him about whether he's actually managed to get her home. It's her first trip in the TARDIS after all; the first one on purpose, that is. The place where they've landed does look a lot like London, but a London that is suspiciously empty. Except for the pterodactyl. Not a good sign.

However, it turns out that it is in fact London, and she is in fact home. Once the dinosaur crisis is over, she's the one who starts it:

"It will be a long time before I get in that TARDIS again."

She lets that hang there and feels just a little bit nervous, unsure of how he will react. She hasn't known him for very long. But he doesn't let her down. He returns her serve with a perfect volley, long and beautifully arced and oh-so-tempting. After a description like that, she just has to agree to go with him to Florana.

They don't get there. She discovers that this will become a pattern.

And that's how it starts.

* * *

"Oooh, I see what you meant about Florana, Doctor. The carpet of perfumed flowers is right under this layer of quarry rocks and dirt, is it?" She coughs, and waves as much of the dust as she can in his general direction.

A pause, then: "Sorry, Sarah Jane, I didn't quite hear what you said. Let's get a move on, shall we?"

She smiles. 15-love to her.

* * *

He boasts that he can be in London five minutes ago and asks who wants to come with him. She watches as the Brigadier and Harry refuse his invitation, then hides her smile as he turns to her.

She draws it out for as long as she can, then says, "All right. Providing we do go straight back to London." 

"Oh yes. Oh, we will. I promise."

She doesn't believe him for a second.

They do go straight back to London, if you define "straight back" as an alien planet 30,000 years into the future, Earth 69 years into the past, another alien planet, and then a rather dangerous journey involving a rocket and an escape capsule which had been made to carry androids and not human beings. Oh, and not actually going to London.

* * *

"What happened to being in London five minutes before we left, Doctor?"

"Don't be so close-minded, Sarah. Even if we are just very slightly off, time has no meaning inside the TARDIS."

"I'll be sure to remember that as soon as we are in fact back in the TARDIS. London is looking very quarry-like for the time of year, by the way."

30-love.

* * *

By the time they do make it back to Earth in the correct year (1911 doesn't count), she has won both game and set by her reckoning. She is suitably smug when they are finally in London. Or rather, Devesham. (Extra points to her for missing London.) It's close enough for a taxi home, and she tells him so.

His ball.

"I'll make you an offer. I'll take you home."

She knows he has no intention of taking her home.

So of course she agrees, and of course they end up on an alien planet. He claims they were intercepted by the Time Lords. She pretends to believe him. Maybe it's even true. 

Lucky shot.

The next time they're back on Earth, he tells her about Cassiopeia. It sounds nice. She wants to go. But they don't go. They wind up in Antarctica instead, and then in Renaissance Italy. This time it's obvious that the TARDIS has been hijacked. So, not his fault. Outside interference.

She decides to count it anyway.

* * *

"Remind me again, Doctor. Was it Cassiopeia or Florana with the sand like swan's down? Because I think I saw some sand while I was being dragged to the dungeon by the Italian soldiers, but it was hard to tell."

40-love.

* * *

They get back to modern London, but then they have to take an alien home. Afterwards they're in the vortex, and he hasn't actually said but she assumes they're on their way to Earth again (not really) when he irritates her with a patronizing remark and then becomes absorbed in tinkering with the TARDIS. He's not listening to her and she goes off on an entire rant. 

"I must be mad," she says as he lays there with his head underneath the console, occasionally asking her to hand him a tool. "I'm sick of being cold and wet, and hypnotized left, right and center. I'm sick of being shot at, savaged by bug-eyed monsters, never knowing if I'm coming, or going, or been. I want a bath, I want my hair washed, I just want to feel human again!" 

"Forget the Zeus plugs," he says, "I'll have the sonic screwdriver." 

"And boy," she replies, "am I sick of that sonic screwdriver!" She watches him ignore her, tinkering away. "I'm going to pack my goodies and I'm going home," she threatens. 

No response.

"I said," she repeats, voice dropping dangerously low, "I'm going to pack my goodies, and I am going home!"

He pays no attention at all, and she stomps out of the room. 

But when she returns with her things all packed (if you're going to bluff, go all the way), he says the wrong thing. He says that she really does have to go.

She doesn't believe it at first. She protests. Then she breaks the rules by telling him straight out that she was joking, she didn't mean it. Desperately she says it must all be a trick, a way to get her to admit that she wants to stay.

But it's not a trick. He's actually making her leave.

When he tells her they've landed, she asks him where, hoping they've missed Earth again. He says they're in South Croydon, her home.

The clock has run out, the clock that she never even knew was there.

She stands and watches as the TARDIS dematerializes without her.

It's only after the TARDIS has disappeared completely that she looks around and realizes that he was wrong. It's not South Croydon; it's Aberdeen.

"I must have been away from home for longer than I thought, Doctor. Croydon looks almost like it's in a completely different country. Say, I don't know . . . Scotland, perhaps?"

Match point to her. She wins.

She waits for the day she'll be able to tell him.


End file.
